


Ships in the Night

by jujubiest



Series: The Longfellow Trilogy [1]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Ficlet, M/M, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Unresolved Romantic Tension, unspoken feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-28
Updated: 2015-11-28
Packaged: 2018-05-03 18:53:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5302895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jujubiest/pseuds/jujubiest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The trouble is he wants, and he knows it's wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ships in the Night

_Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing,_  
_Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness;_  
_So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another,_  
_Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence._

_-_ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,  _Tales of a Wayside Inn_

* * *

 

Harrison Wells watches Barry Allen when he thinks Barry isn’t paying attention, his face fixed in a perpetual frown, his eyes pained. The trouble is he isn’t as single-minded as he would like to believe. The trouble is that although this isn’t his world, he finds himself exiled to it for the time being and growing swiftly, alarmingly attached.

The trouble is he _wants,_ and he knows it’s wrong. He’s twice Barry’s age, old enough to be his father. Hell, he has a daughter not much younger than Barry.

When did he let himself become a sad, lonely old man, so easily distracted by a pretty face?

He thinks to himself that it would be so much easier if a pretty face were really all that Barry had to recommend him. But every day he exists within the sphere of Barry’s effusive loyalty, compassion, and brilliance is another day he falls a little more in love.

So he does the only think he can think of to stop it: he withdraws from the group as much as possible.

* * *

Barry Allen steals furtive glances at Harrison Wells when he thinks no one’s looking, averting his eyes the moment the man turns that piercing, attentive gaze his way. He craves that attention on him and knows it’s selfish, that Wells has more important things to worry about. And moreover, that his fascination with the man amounts to little more than a sickness.

Harrison’s face should be something straight from Barry’s nightmares. His smile should make Barry’s blood run cold.

The trouble is, ever since Harrison showed up the nightmares have shifted, purged of his face, as though being shown a real version of Harrison Wells has robbed the false shade of its power.

Barry doesn’t understand this helpless, relentless longing, the gnawing need he feels whenever their eyes catch for even a second. He doesn’t know how, with everything else going on in his life, his brain manages to stutter to a halt and his undivided attention to hopelessly stick on Harrison Wells the moment the man enters a room.

He knows it’s silly. He’s just a kid to Dr. Wells, and probably a nuisance, too. He knows Wells needs him to fight Zoom, but aside from that, what is he? In what world would a man like Harrison Wells pay any attention to a guy like him?


End file.
